Can MARVEL survive as its own studio?

Well Colt, this is a risky move, but if it pays off and Marvel DOES survive as it's own studio, this can only be a good thing. The main people who will benefit I think are the audience, especially the comic book fans in the audience, because with Marvel themselves holding the strings, the fans can be almost guaranteed a faithfull as can be adaptation of thier favourite heroes.
However, if what I read was right, and Marvel's going to greenlight a sequel the "The Hulk" as one of it's first movies, then they certainly aren't playing it safe. With the lukewarm reception the original movie made (both comercially and, arguably, critically), this venture could fall as soon as it's risen.
But Avi Arad seems a man of resolve and good business sense, so if he says he can turn the "Hulk" franchise around, then I am inclined to believe him.

Can a studio survive by focusing solely on superhero pix? Or is Marvel planning on broadening its horizons (sorry, I've been too lazy to read up on what exactly the mission statement of the movie arm will be). If it is the former, I think that spells doom (as in corporate weasel-with-generic-lightening-powers doom, NOT as in bad-ass-latverian-dictator-with-dark-magic doom). Genres come and go, and at some point people will have their fill of superheroes for awhile.

I hope so. The fans will have something to be very excited about and if Marvel should fail--there will be no one to blame. Time will tell ...

As long as the reins are in Avi Arad's hands, Marvel movies, except for Spider-Man (which is controlled with an iron fist by Sony) are destined for mediocrity.

Without Spider-Man and X-Men in-house, Marvel's two most marketable franchises, I don't see how this will work out for them. There probably will be a few hits, but I see a lot more relative failures than flat out successes for them. Lack of variety being the biggest hindrance.

I think its a good move. I know the comic market is shrinking every year and this allows Marvel to expand into a growing market and help bolster their comic sales by getting people excited about their characters. As long as they put out realtively good movies they are all but certain to make money, domestic, plus foreign and DVD sales make almost every movie profitable. ALso if they balance big name, FX driven movies, like Iron man, Hulk 2, with smaller cheaper films that highlight their lesser known characters and are designed to do well in the DVD market. Characters like Luke Cage, Nick Fury, Punisher, and others should do well in medium budget action films.

Can anyone say "AVENGERS, BITCH?"

Look, the possibilities are fairly numerous. A Power Pack film for kids. Thor could be reimagined as a fantasy film (hint: hire WETA!) The only thing that Marvel is lacking is non-superhero properties. Vertigo (and some early adult DC stuff) is a treasure trove of great ideas.

Boy. I tell ya, this sounds risky... but Avi has done pretty well by the company so far... Speaking from experience: I had an internship and was doing some freelance at Marvel in the mid 90's during their huge financial woes and the place was Armageddon. Editors losing their jobs left and right. People being replaced by computers... Marvel was paying for my full tuition to art school at the time and luckily they never stopped paying... it got scary a few times.

It will never get as bad as it was 10 years ago (shit it's been that long!). The comic industry has always fluctuated and with the success of Marvel films from the past few years, I think Hollywood has learned a big lesson on how to handle SuperHero flicks and that comics are a great source for material in other genres as well...

These lesser characters (if you can consider Cap lesser) also won't cost as much to make it to the big screen as Spidey & X-Men... if their smart & I'm sure they are, we'll be seeing more theatrical movies, DTV, tv shows, cartoons, video games, etc. It's already started with the Avengers dvd, Blade tv show...

Good characters never fade... hopefully Marvel as a company won't either. Comics & Cinema are our modern myth... they make a great combo...

As much as I'm glad they're getting good talent attached to these projects, when I see them getting on the ball with Thor and Captain America I feel nothing but jealous rage. They're MY projects, damnit! Just wait a couple fucking years, willya Marvel?! They're MINE!

What's your take?... Personally, I wanna see a WW2 Cap ala Saving Private Ryan (with helmet and all):

http://www.toymania.com/columns/rtmi...tcapbust.shtml

and a Thor that reads like Conan meets LOTR...

I could fill a thread on either movie, but I'm caught between

A. catching the ridicule and labelling of "shitty fanfic" the moment I post anything, and more importantly

B. somebody would steal it! (possibly. ya never know. apparently all the studios watch these message boards like hawks)

But if that's the case, and the movie goes forward now without me ever getting a chance to try for the reins, then it would still be cool to see some of my ideas on the screen for the character. Ah well.

How do you want to be involved: writer, director, etc? There's no need to say anything specific. Just curious on what kind of level will you take them?--granted the chance to work on them. For I want to tackle the X-Men franchise ( if you must laugh: go ahead ) I have certain concepts: I believe will invigorate the X-Men world. When I'm established: I hope Marvel, Fox, or whomever has the rights will grant me that opportunity. I would be writing and directing.

I hope it works. I think Avi Arad, no matter how much fans bitch about him at times, easliy helped save Marvel (read Comic Wars by Dan Raviv), and is pretty shrewd.

Even with the mediocre Marvel films, most have turned a profit. Arad has said the only one he considered a bomb is Elektra.

I think Hulk 2 is actually a great idea. It's one of their top 3 recognized properties. The first film just didn't click with mainstream audiences, and Arad admits it.

I compare Hulk to Star Trek: The Motion picture. Some people love it and think it's a classic, some people hate it and think it was a missed opportunity, but it just wasn't what the mass appeal audience wanted out of it. Hulk can have its "Wrath of Khan:" a more mainstream movie, less navel gazing and more action/humor/adventure. I think it can work.

I don;t think you can really argue with the success Marvel has had so far. And yes, Arad does deserve a lot of credit for maintaining in a lot of cases the same formula and approach the films depite being spread over different studios. He could have made "Captain America" now, but he's waiting to do it right. I think he cares about getting the movies done right, and that's good.

I don't see how you couldn't parlay "Nick Fury", "Captain America", "Iron Man", and even "Hulk 2" into considerable hits. People were excited about "Hulk-smash" until they realized it wasn't what they expected and bitched about it to their friends. The others are high concept properties and damn near A-list superheroes.

I like this idea. It's risky sure, but having the comic company making its own movies is pretty revolutionary.

You know Lou, good point. I never thought of it this way. Believe it or not, I liked it. A lot of people were sceptical of Ang Lee's more artistic approach, and it is evident in the film (to wit- shots which explore the texture of rocks, leaves and trees, and the general geographical properties of the action's surrounding areas), the dream sequences, the hallucinations and the exploration of certain thematic elements, like all the stuff with Banner and his father, which leads on the the MAIN theme the film explores: How all our problems in life, are somehow caused by our parents.
Some people I guess thought that these themes are a bit too weighty and cerebral, for what is essentially, a film about a big green guy who smashes shit up. BUT, I think it worked in the film's favour, and had the opposite effect. These artistic meanderings made the film actually seem EVEN MORE "comic booky" IMO. Whether or not that was deliberate I'm unsure of, but it was an interesting way to go about things. And I think the film works on a lot of levels. I like it, I think it's one of the best.
But I do agree with you, they can't continue in this vein for a sequel. It would have to be more mainstream, as this approach I think can only work for one franchise movie. So maybe you're right. If they can just concentrate on making the next one a kick ass action movie, Marvel could have a hit on it's hands, and it would be a bold opening salvo which would seal the new studio's future.
I would like them to keep the same cast though. Eric Bana is very good, as is Connelly, Elliott, et al. They inhabited these roles and made them thier own. I think if they recast the sequel, it would be a little too distracting, given the new film's inbuilt "more action" approach.
And despite the new movie's approach, I think it should still be a proper sequel and reference the first film, and continue from where it left off.
A good move for the sequel would be to bring in a proper villian from the Hulk comics.
I guess if done this way, the film could really be a goer. Sadly though, I think it would have to lose Ang Lee.
I reckon Doug Liman would be an interesting choice.

Arad needs to get someone who is good with effects on a reasonable budget, and less apt to wander and rock the boat, if he wants to get the "Hulk 2" he's talking about. I'd suggest somebody like Joe Johnston ("The Rocketeer", "Jurassic Park III").

To be honest, my main fear is Avi Arad's bsiness sense getting in the way of actual moviemaking. I'd really like if he looked at, say, "Nick Fury" and though "Good spy movie" instead of, "Nick Fury 2, toys, tie-ins, big stars, internet podcasts!"

Yes, I'd hate to see that happen to superhero movies after so many years of being unsullied by crass merchandising or commercial gain.

Even the few Marvel films that were misfires - Daredevil, Elektra - weren't bad because of overexposure of an emphasis on merchandising. And it didn't hurt "X-Men" or "Spider-Man" at all.

The key is going to be finding the right directors and actors to go with the projects. They started so well getting guys like Raimi and Singer to helm their properties and then as time went on bland choices like Rob Bowen, Mark Steven Johnson, and Tim Story started to get the call. In those cases I'm sure the studios had most of the power in choosing a director. With Marvel acting as its own entity it will be interesting to see just what kind of directors they're willing to hand their characters to.

Seeing as how all of those bland picks for director were under Fox, I definitely see them as the culprit. I don't think they got it, and with Ratner on "X3", I think that further solidifies the point. Also though, stuff like "daredevil" and "Elektra" were not top properties. I was actually excited about Bowman coming off "Reign of Fire" and then he just went to hell.

But the hiring of Favreau is absolutely fantastic news. I love the guy, and I think he's a very promising director, capable of handling all genres. I feel comfortable with him having it, and if this is indicative of the sort of picks we can expect, this arrangement could be special.

For the most part it's FOX, you're right. But Sony tabbed Johnson again for GHOST RIDER, and though that is still months from being released, I just don't see why that guy keeps getting shots with some of their characters. I don't even really believe DAREDEVIL was all that bad, but there was no reason for that character to end up in such a mediocre film.

I'm curious if Marvel's move to create their own studio might explain why PUNISHER 2 has stalled a bit. Like HULK 2, I imagine the rights to the character might expire at its current studio pretty soon.

I think I remember hearing that. They came up with this similar deal with Artisan a few years back, to make their own films, but understandably once Marvel films got huge, they wanted out of the Artisan deal. I would think they might get "Punisher 2" back, and I hope so, because it could be pretty cool. It's economical by definition, and the first did pretty well on DVD I believe.

Sony and MSJ is indeed sort of odd, especially with the predictably bad buzz coming out of that thing. Isn't it now delayed until 2007?

Yeah, it completed filming before X3 even began and it has been scrapped until I think February of '07. I would have thought GHOST RIDER would make sense for an August summer release after the major blockbusters have been out for a while.

Again, I'm not even a DAREDEVIL hater but I can't for the life of me see how anyone watches that film and thinks "That Johnson guy! He's who we need to bring life to Ghost Rider."

It still has its problems, but I thought the director's cut was a lot better. Less Elektra, more Favreau, a nice legal subplot, a couple nice scenes added back in, and more violent fight scenes. I think if it had debuted first, the reaction wouldn;t have been quite as terrible. The soundtrack and what not still blows, but the DC feels like a better and more complete film.

I quite liked "Daredevil", both the original and the extended version. I think it's quite bold and brave if you ask me. It ain't perfect by a long shot, but you gotta admire a film that's willing to take a risk.
However, I ain't seen "Elektra" yet. Don't want to either. It looks shit.

I think if they're looking to make epics, they're in trouble, because while I don't think there's going to be a fatigue, the success of the superhero model had plateaued. But they have a lot of great, cinematic properties that don't have to be tights and eyebeams. A movie based on characters from the Savage Land. Or why not pull a Blade with some of its stable of Western characters?

Both "Spider-Man" films crested $400 million. "X2" made nearly $300 IIRC. "Batman Begins" made over $200 million and did great on DVD. Even "Daredevil" made over $100. I don't see muc wrong with the superhero genre. People want the films to be good, but if they are, I think the properties they have are diverse enough that there won't be a "not another superhero movie" sort of fatigue.

There always going to be hits, I'm just saying expectations have to be kept level. Like, don't go into Green lantern thinking it's an automatic 300 million earner--or even a 200 million one.